From Emergency Message EM-24005:
... On January 20, 2024, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York approved a settlement agreement in Campos v. Kijakazi, No. 21-cv-05143. The case involved Title XVI overpayments incurred during the COVID-19 pandemic from March 2020 through April 2023.
C. FO [Field Office] instructions
Effective immediately, when making a fault determination on a waiver request for an overpayment incurred in any month since March 2020, technicians must consider any circumstances related to the COVID-19 pandemic that an overpaid individual alleges prevented the individual from reporting changes. When COVID-19 circumstances are alleged, technicians must also document the individual’s allegations of COVID-19 circumstances that prevented the individual from reporting changes in the file. ...
Examples of circumstances related to the COVID-19 pandemic that may have prevented an individual from complying with Title II or Title XVI reporting requirements include, but are not limited to, the following scenarios:
The overpaid individual:
- attempted to contact us but was unable to visit a FO, mail us information, reach us by phone, or get transportation because of the COVID-19 pandemic;
- was unable to contact us because of government-imposed COVID-19 travel restrictions;
- was unable to contact us because of child-care or family-care changes due to COVID-19 stay-at-home orders or school-at-home requirements;
- was unable to contact us because of the overpaid individual’s COVID-19 illness or related serious illness;
- was unable to contact us because the overpaid individual’s representative payee died or became seriously ill due to COVID-19 or serious illness related to COVID-19; or
- was unable to contact us because the overpaid individual’s immediate family member died or became seriously ill due to COVID-19 or related serious illness.
NOTE: This list is not exhaustive. ...
This will not alter the at fault determination in any case where the CS was already doing their job correctly.
ReplyDeleteCorrect
DeleteThese advocacy groups are well intended but them fighting a problem that doesn’t seem to exist any moreso than pre-Covid. There are far greater concerns these folks should focus on to make meaningful change (advocate for an SSI resource limit increase, etc)
ReplyDelete"attempted to contact us but was unable to visit a FO, mail us information, reach us by phone, or get transportation because of the COVID-19 pandemic;"
ReplyDeletelololol. unable to mail information? how is that possible. Mail is picked up at every US residence daily.
But mail was not received and reviewed by the agency offices because they were closed. This means the mail went to an empty closed office for a few years before anyone got the mail. I am serious.
DeleteNot true. Mail was received by FO’s. It did not sit for years.
DeleteMail did sit for a couple days until management scanned it into the system. Even with slow scanning and profiling, the mail was seen by somebody within weeks at the worst. The staff wasn't in the office but management was. Our mid sized office got hundreds of pieces of mail daily. If no one did anything with it the office wouldn't have had room for employees when they reopened. Management also mailed out claims, receipts, letters, etc when employees were all at home.
Delete@12:20...thats not the point of the EM. This EM discusses the impact it had on a claimant ability to communicate, travel, etc...not on the recipient.
ReplyDelete